No more nuts in the airport for me

As I walked through the TSA screener at the airport in Seattle, I saw my carry-on had been put in what I thought was the wrong place. I tried to get someone’s attention so I could get my bag and move along. A woman TSA agent walked past me and said tersely, “Just wait.”

Soon, a male TSA agent grabbed my bag and motioned for me to join him at a counter. We stood by my bag and he pointed to an x-ray of it and said, “They think those look like pills - what are they?” “Nuts,” said I. As he opened my bag and started to rummage through it, I explained.

“Right before we left the house this morning I realized I might get hungry and need some quick protein so I grabbed a baggie and put some mixed nuts in it and then put it in my carry-on.” By this time he had opened the bag, seen the nuts, and was satisfied. “Good idea,” he said as he walked away.

Fast forward seven days. I’m packing my bag to come home. I had eaten some of the nuts but not all of them. They aren’t going to get me this time, I thought to myself, and put the baggie in my suitcase. Going through the TSA screener in California, the woman agent who looked like happiness had not visited her in her entire life,  asked me if there was any food in my carry-on. “No,” I said, “there used to be but not anymore.”

After I went through the x-ray machine, she told me I had to have a full pat-down. She pointed to the x-ray results that showed yellow light where both of my empty pockets were. I told her I had no idea why something was showing up and she proceeded to do her job. I kept quiet, of course, but thought to myself that if she ever wanted to change careers, she would be a good massage therapist since she had no qualms about touching a stranger everywhere.

Fast forward again to the next morning. We had retrieved our dogs from the kennel, emptied our suitcases and had enjoyed a quiet evening at home. I was up early and sitting at my desk. I pulled a tarot book out, one I had taken with me on the trip. It had been in my suitcase. I saw an interesting piece of paper sticking out of the book and pulled it out to look at it. TSA had searched my suitcase!

They were probably trying to see what those pills-that-were-really-nuts actually were. My only regret? I wish I had seen what page in the tarot book they put the piece of paper in. There might have been a good message there for me. I will never know. What I do know is this: no more nuts for me when I travel by plane.